Pages From
The Coach’s Playbook
My ultimate goal is to write useful and relevant content about everything related to creating success and getting you to the next level.
Sometimes however, I do find myself just blogging about things that need to be talked about, so don’t be surprised by what you find popping up here. I always welcome all useful comments, suggestions and critiques. So come often, bring a friend, and stay as long as you’d like!
Jeff asks...
In The Ten Golden Rules of PSA you indicate Rule #8 is – All work is scheduled in 3 days in advance.
I understand that if everything is a priority then nothing is, but How do you arrive at the "3" days?
Also, I assume the 3 days out is for field service only? We also provide a...
Most small and medium-sized companies address customer service issues related to the mechanism we call Service Delivery as just part of the day-to-day ongoing workload and never really track it. The only tracking is the recent relevant memory of those involved. And if it was a particularly bad...
The Challenge
I do believe that any business needs a way to benchmark its overall maturity and I do not believe it is necessary for it to be relative to any other business. Of course if the measuring system you select can in fact help gauge your maturity relative to other businesses, especially...
When it comes to the execution on the strategy you've laid out for your business, the old methods are sorely lacking in many ways. Much like the waterfall method of project management brought about the advent of agile project management, it's time for a paradigm shift for business strategy...
Stop me if you've heard this one…
I’m no longer surprised by the number of companies that end up with the wrong people working for them, and for a ridiculously long time at that, before it is remedied. What else would you expect if your behavior is to wait until the last minute to...
About 25 years ago, I worked for a manufacturing company in Portland, Oregon. The owner had box seats for the Portland Trailblazers basketball team. It didn't take me long to figure out that some of the employees there would literally throw down for a chance to get that week’s tickets. Of...
Time is your Widget!
If you're in the service industry in pretty much any fashion, Time is your widget. It's your pizza, shoe, car, chocolate bar, dress, lemon, nut. bolt, or screw. My personal stand on this is hard line and straightforward: If you fail to count and track your widgets, no matter...
Agile Service Delivery releases your service department from the constraints of conventional service delivery and allows your entire team to function with a level of autonomy far superior to those still preached by your PSA solution providers. I have been using the term Agile Service Delivery for...
If you’re in IT, then you’re in a fast-paced industry that has high demands for being dynamic. And dynamic means knowing who the next five people you will be hiring are well in advance. It should be an integral part of your People Process to continually be searching for new, awesome...
Background
By now, most everyone knows that last week (just ahead of the World Wide Partner Conference), Microsoft announced the end of life for their Small Business Server product line. And last year, Microsoft announced the demise of the Small Business Specialist Certification. In near...
Communication is arguably the most important skill you can have in life and in business. If you can communicate with different people, on different levels, and in different languages, you are what helps build bridges and tie people together. This is true in your personal life, your business and...
The SMB managed services industry has a tool that is not just creeping into the industry, but more and more it is being demanded by the industry. If you are an MSP, you are likely seeing the buzzwords of ITIL being thrown around in marketing material product spec sheets. What is both interesting...
